Educational gamesmaker Preloaded has recently made two strategy games for English TV station Channel 4. 1066 is a mix of tactics, insult-typing, bowmanship, rhythm-game and narration by Ian Holm. Trafalgar Origins is all Napoleonic high seas derringdo all the time, as you sail your English ship in real time against the damnable French and Spanish. Whether you want to hoist the sails or call your opponent a stench weasel, they are fun little games which have the added bonus of teaching you about British history. Both games can be played solo or multiplayer. [via Rock Paper Shotgun, where they like those games quite a lot]posted by Kattullus (14 comments total)
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When I was your age, education games were just fancy spelling bees. Kids these days.posted by Hoenikker at 8:00 PM on May 5, 2010

1066 is a cool game until you realize that you can win every battle just with archers and insults. I remember reading this one article on gamedesign that if you give your player a boring, repetitive, but easy way to win, not only will they play this way, they will dislike your game for it. And I sat there, fighting the battles in the most boring way possible, knowing I would have more fun if I played in the way intended, and observed that I had no desire to do so. And came away not liking the game. Fun times.

I am having no such problems with Trafalgar.

Wow. I thought 1066 was going to be in the fashion of Warfare 1917, but it is so much more. Is there a name for this type of sidescroller?

I don't know of one, but it's a very popular flash "strategy" genre. Sea of Fire was the first good one that I played, 3 years ago. They're kind of a staple at this point. Tower defense games were still mildly novel when I was playing it. They may be a spiritual offshoot. There's a warfare 1944 out now as well.posted by Bobicus at 8:06 PM on May 5, 2010

I'm just here to say that rps is the best thing on the Internet.posted by empath at 8:18 PM on May 5, 2010

Great fun, Hardrada gets it in the neck again.posted by tellurian at 8:24 PM on May 5, 2010

Channel 4 also has that Bow Street Runner game. Warning: contains trace-the-line minigames which in some incarnations may well be impossible with laptop trackpad and aggravatingly difficult with mouse.posted by juv3nal at 10:47 PM on May 5, 2010

The Wilhelm scream makes Trafalgar quite rewarding.posted by Picklegnome at 5:25 AM on May 6, 2010

It's unplayably cpu intensive for me. Also, not fun. I seem to just spend forever turning away from everything.posted by a robot made out of meat at 9:30 AM on May 6, 2010

I like Trafalgar quite a bit, especially because I got invited to watch Horatio Hornblower movies about five minutes before I saw this link!

However, I carefully maneuvered my ship until I got a perfect stem-to-stern shot off, and it actually did less damage than a normal broadside. So that was disappointing.posted by Squid Voltaire at 3:33 PM on May 6, 2010

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